[MAFIA WIN] Second Anniversary Fanfic Mafia - Game Thread

[windskull]

AND, Rascal just happens to choose to hide behind Lexx, even though he's a juicy target for a potential mafiakill and therefore a bad person to hide behind.

[[Are we still assuming Rascal is a hider? It's definitely possible, don't get me wrong, but the only "proof" we have of it was Bench's lie. It does make some sense though and resolves why that death happened at all.

On the subject of arsonist... I do agree that the arsonist is more than likely eliminated. However, as we've had two partially inactive and one quiet player thus far, I don't want to discount the possibility that there is a second third party, who is the arsonist, and that they're still around. Basically just. I don't want to put the possibility completely out of mind.]]

 

[Dragonfree]

[[Yeah, I wouldn’t want to treat Rascal being Hider as more confirmed than it is... there are other explanations for multiple kills on N1. I don’t think that changes much, though.]]

 

[windskull]

[[last post before I go to work. Can discuss more later. Right now the two targets I think I would be most comfortable with lynching are Chappie and Namco.

Chappie: if I'm following Elyvorg's logic correctly, if Chappie flips town, it man's that its more likely that Spark/braxien is town (since they were either the mafias original target, Chappie was blocked, or a piercing kill was used), while putting more suspicion on Altair and Wes. Although I'm not quite sure I follow the value of she flips mafia. I think it makes the other three look a bit more suspicious? But I'm not 100% sure here.

Namco: has been mostly lurking. I've been hesitant to push since I know them irl and know most most of what's been keeping them busy. But most of those matters have been resolved and they're still being kind of quiet so it just makes me go hmmmm a little.

Additionally I would like to see espy and fuse talk more but as of right now they're both still null for me.

I'll think on this more and probably case a vote before I go to bed tonight.]]

 

[Equitial]

[[
alright, bunch of stuff happening. I'm going to break up my posts. I have more thoughts than this, but for now I'll talking about the Arsonist and the issue of overdosing

Arsonist/Lusamine's Killer

Based on the scorch marks, I just have to assume that the Arsonist is still around. To me this is a case of Negrek would not make things unclear if she didn't have to. She could have written literally anything else for the flavor; she was the one who put the Arsonist in the game. I hear what other people are saying but I'm going with Navar was some other kind of third-party, and our fire-setter's still out there.

But, other people are pointing out that the hypothetical Arsonist's moves don't make much sense strategically. However... what if that's because they weren't paying much attention to the game until now? I feel kind of bad for sussing the players who literally just got here, but I'm marking Braixen (Zoroark)/Espeon and Cold Fusion/Fusion as very sus.

arghhhh, this game. Anyway, to make clear, I think that 1) DW should probably choose rolestopper and 2) if a vig did kill Lusamine, think very hard before claiming. Tbh, I don't know what exactly I would do in this situation, but err on the side of caution.

The Issure of Overdosing

Now, overdosing. Immediately after claiming and trying to log off, I tried to think of strats we could use now that we doctors know each other. Something I worked out was that maybe Yellow and I openly choose our targets. Now, that would make us incredibly susceptible to killers/roleblockers, but we can have Abra Bus Drive one of us at random. Our abilities are unaffected, but now the Mafia has a 50/50 chance of failing their intended move. 50% odds aren't great, so we could rest pretty secure in that me/Wes/our targets will be okay. Plus, that narrows down the pool for certain info-roles to watch.

Of course, then came the sus discussion on Wes and Abra. Needless to say, if either of them are Mafia thing could go very, very wrong. Soooooo, not sure how practical this plan is in reality, but I thought I was real smart for thinking of it so I wanted to share anyway lololol

For what it's worth, I'm actually leaning that Wes is innocent. Some of this comes from me believing the Arsonist is still around. So, there's ofc the Mafia, two third-parties, and a Doctor searching out overdoses? A lot of people have been dying, but that feels too out-of-balance for the townside--so many killers, not counting a Townie Vig.

I'll bring more theories later, but right now I'm going Wes is Town, Abra more likely to be scum. I'm not going to announce my healing intentions unless Townies are in agreement; but, Wes--if you're innocent--if we don't coordinate I think our best odds are to choose our targets randomly, as I was doing.

Mafia Frustration

Okay, now about the newbies who are feeling frustrated, I really need to echo what others are saying--you're not dumb for making mistakes. Mafia is a hard game with a lot of moving pieces, and I assure any player you consider "experienced" has made plenty of errors. For example, during my first game when I was Mafia, I tried to fakeclaim and immediately blew my cover because what I claimed was mechanically impossible. In the Fall Game, I 1) started a wagon which mislynched the Cop), 2) afterward with ultimate confidence sussed and got another innocent lynched, and 3) literally married the enemy.

I don't know if this way of thinking is helpful to any but me, but I figured I may as well share. If you're getting sussed/making a bad play, I feel like there are only a number of possibilities based on your alignment. 1) If you're innocent, any Town is targeting you or boosting your theory is making just as big a mistake as you could; this is not a solo game; you and your teammates live or die together. Not to mention, the Mafia is probably in some way trying to turn the Town against each other. Basically, you're facing misunderstanding/inobservantness from your teammates, plus malignant influence from the party who knows you're innocent.

2) If you're Mafia (or 3rd party, I'm assuming), honestly that's a bit of an oof for a newbie. From my experience, you feel a lot more pressure when you're scum than when you're innocent, doubly so if you're still trying to figure out how the whole game works. Imo, when you're Mafia, you should consider every day you don't get lynched a victory. The whole thing is very nerve-wracking and not easy. I wish you a very sincere good luck.

Now, since I've been the major person sussing you, @Seren, please know that I bear no actual ill will toward you, nor do I think that you're inherently a bad player whether you're innocent/guilty/other. I don't know if this helps at all, but here's what differentiated your suspicion of me from the other newcomers':

• The way you presented two completely different interpretations of me--that I was Mafia or that I was a powerful info-role--which would have helped scum if I were sussed or made to softclaim. The first time I attempt my aggressive Day 1 strat, I didn't end up ultimately hitting scum, but I did unearth several of them who told on themselves by being self-contradicting or seemed like they were info-hunting. BEcause of this, in this game I was specifically on lookout for that kind of behavior.
• The way you followed me throughout that first day. It reminded me of my first scumplay, where I chose one innocent to sus and stuck to him 'til I couldn't anymore. So, just a familiar vibe.
• In contrast with Wes's accusation, yours feels more suspicious to me because it had a better chance of succeeding. There were other newcomers side-eying me, so you had a chance to maybe get a mislynch without looking too out-of-place.

I'm sorry that you're not enjoying the game, but I'm not sure what I can do to help other than reassure you every player will make mistakes when playing Mafia and that I have nothing personal against you. Either I'm making a mistake or not, but I'm trying my best, as presumably are you.


Scumreads

Now I'm going to look at the other players who are in the spotlight today: Wes and Abra. I'll start with Wes.

Wes

I don't think that Wes's move against Elyvorg was scummy because it did just feel like newbie flailing. Also, compare it to what Phan did. If Wes is guilty, that means they were Phan's scumbuddy, so both of their moves against Elyvorg would have been in coordination. I guess you can take what you want from that, but for me it just feels odd for Mafia? Idk, I feel like Phan would have stopped after seeing Elyvorg's reaction and everyone's dismissal of Wes.

However, if Wes is Mafia, I don't think they're fakeclaiming their Doctor role. As I briefly mentioned, I suspected overdose immediately when I saw Wes's reaction. That could be bait to lure me out, but then there's the whole overdose thing. This is the first TR game with it; I was big surprised was I saw that amendment, so how could the Mafia think it a probably thing to gambit on without knowing beforehand?

Abra

First off, DawningWinds was questioning them for their specific motive in swapping Lexx and Spark. I was the one who actually started that, but I didn't or don't consider that much a cause for suspicion. I suspected more that they had misspoke when first explaining what they had done; what they claim now fits that, but you know. My biggest point of sus is what Elyvorg pointed out:



Okay, this kind of role-heavy tangle is not something I'm great at, but let me provide so alternate reasons for how two people died when Abra swapped. Again, roleblocker, taking other people's criticisms. Like, I dunno, there's a Rolecop who scoped out Abra Day 1 and then the Roleblocker decided to block to prevent the chaos. Also, we still actually don't know how Rascal died. I am of the belief that the Arsonist is still around, so Navar... was he also a killer?

You know, I'm beginning to realize I may have a bias for people who have roleclaimed with no immediate opposition. So, um, onlookers can keep this in mind, I guess? I want to go through all the players again and try to figure out who's actually mechanically confirmed as innocent, try some more out-of-the-box thinking.

Everyone else

I'll go ahead and put in a spoiler.

Now, my general readlist:

]]

 

[Equitial]

[[...I was not done writing that post yet]]

 

[Equitial]

[[
uh, I was still writing the Abra section, though you can see some of my drafted thoughts. I also haven't looked over the Mafia Frustrations and Wes's section yet so there may be more typos.
]]

 

[Equitial]

[[A quick nitpick before I actually finish my Wes/Abra thoughts. (Yeah, Wes wasn't really done either)

Lusamine, Wes and Altair - the three people that I was, after yesterday's voting, suspecting the most - just happened to be the three who encouraged Chappie to softclaim. I just feel like that's a bit of a weird coincidence! Of any three people who happened to decide to coax Chappie into telling us what she knew, it was the exact three that I (at the time I thought about this) was most suspecting of being mafia?

In case something happens with this, I'm pretty sure I also encouraged to Chappie to come out with what she knew. This was after she had softclaimed *something* with saying Lexx was their fault. My reasoning (which I don't regret) is that since they're already admitting to knowing something, that something might as well benefit the rest of the Town.

Now back to the scumreads.

Wes

I kind of see what Elyvorg is saying about Yellow/Wes, but at the same time, I kind of don't. For me, their sudden move on Elyvorg--a player who was on most people's hard town list--mostly feels like newbie flailing. It kind of reminds me of a Desper gambit in the last anniversary game, for those who remember. Yellow wanted to help and figure out the game, so they thought of a possible but implausible theory and seized on it.
except I don't think that Wes's move against Elyvorg was scummy because it did just feel like newbie flailing.

Also, consider that Phan also tried a Elyvorg sus after Wes. If Wes is guilty, that means they were Phan's scumbuddy, and their moves against Elyvorg would have been in coordination. Other people may have different interpretations, but for me it seems odd that the Mafia would have one sus mostly fail and then try again.

However, if Wes is Mafia, I don't think they're fakeclaiming their Doctor role. As I briefly mentioned, I suspected overdose immediately when I saw Wes's reaction. That could be bait to lure me out, but this is the first TR game with an overdose mechanic. I was big surprised was I saw that amendment, so how could the Mafia think it a probable thing to gambit on without knowledge beforehand?

Abra

First off, DawningWinds was questioning them for their specific motive in swapping Lexx and Spark. I was the one who actually started that, but I didn't and don't consider that much a cause for suspicion. I suspected more that they had misspoke when first explaining what they had done; what they claim now fits that, but you know. My biggest point of sus is what Elyvorg pointed out:

To make sure I'm making myself clear outside of Tefirenspeech: the blocking theory would require two unlikely things to have happened:

• The mafia roleblocker happens to target Chappie, for no particular reason as she hadn't claimed or softclaimed anything important on day 1.
• Rascal happens to hide behind Lexx, who (even if Flyg0n didn't know the Chibi-always-dies meme) was a very likely mafia target based on his clear competence on Day 1 and therefore a terrible choice to hide behind. I know I suggested yesterday when I was theorising that maybe Rascal might have chosen that anyway for RP reasons, but I'm not sure I believe that so much any more. Possible, but also unlikely.

Putting it that way, yeah. Targetting Spark would be an odd thing for the Mafia to do, and there's been crazy coincidences in Mafia before, but this is a good point. I really believed and still want to believe that Abra is Town. (I'm beginning to realize I may have a bias for people who have roleclaimed with no immediate opposition. Probably something I should work on, try to think more out-of-the-box.

There are still plenty of ways that Abra could be truthful and other roles behind the scene just obfuscated things. For example, maybe a Mafia has a Rolecop and a Roleblocker; Rolecop who scoped out Abra Day 1 and then the Roleblocker decided to block to prevent the chaos. Also, since I believe Navar wasn't the Arsonist, maybe they were some other kind of third-party killer. Or maybe something with a Strongman?

But... if Abra's a Mafia Bus Driver, that does provide an explanation that's perfectly likely as well. I'm not going to try to put pressure on someone who says they won't be watching the game, but I'm willing to vote for Abra--more so than Wes.

(That's all I'll post for now, but I guess you know that I also intend to update my reads on everyone, plus I'm sure I'll think of more miscellaneous stuff. (I'm not drafting in-thread anymore lol)
]]

 

[Dragonfree]

Chappie: if I'm following Elyvorg's logic correctly, if Chappie flips town, it man's that its more likely that Spark/braxien is town (since they were either the mafias original target, Chappie was blocked, or a piercing kill was used), while putting more suspicion on Altair and Wes. Although I'm not quite sure I follow the value of she flips mafia. I think it makes the other three look a bit more suspicious? But I'm not 100% sure here.

[[No, elyvorg's logic is that if Chappie flips mafia, this may cast suspicion on Spark/Braixen.

The basis for this is that if Chappie is mafia, the whole gambit where Chappie emotionally claims bus driver who swapped Lexx and Spark becomes sort of a funny thing for the mafia to pull - why draw attention to the fact there's something funny about the kill? Well, potentially just because it's a roleclaim, and people who claim a useful role tend to get trusted by default. But also, potentially they wanted to clear Spark, since the swap means the mafia (very likely) targeted Spark. Usually the mafia would not target a mafia member, so by default having been targeted by the mafia means a player is pretty much definitely not mafia. However, if the mafia control the bus driver, they can choose to swap the intended target with one of their own, and then target that mafia member - the kill ends up on the target, but if the town believes the bus driver is innocent, they assume the mafia member the target was swapped with is cleared.

This is pretty galaxy brain and not at all necessarily true even if Chappie is mafia, but it's a possibility.]]

 

[Inkedust]

Lusamine, Wes and Altair - the three people that I was, after yesterday's voting, suspecting the most - just happened to be the three who encouraged Chappie to softclaim.

[[Eh, not really. That was just Altair RP flavour/trying to potentially get info out for the Town. I wasn't even looking for a soft-claim, just
a general idea of what'd happened to inform my posts/theories more. Additionally, I don't understand how this makes me more suspicious. If I was scum, what reason would I have for trying or even encouraging the Mafia Driver to claim?

I'm still not fully convinced that Chappie is scum but your explanations make a lot of sense and is giving me a lot to consider, so I'll definitely be looking at her more thoroughly when making my reads.

Chappie: if I'm following Elyvorg's logic correctly, if Chappie flips town, it man's that its more likely that Spark/braxien is town (since they were either the mafias original target, Chappie was blocked, or a piercing kill was used), while putting more suspicion on Altair and Wes.

How does Chappie flipping Town make me more suspicious? I'm genuinely confused here, because you also insinuate that I'll still look worse if she flips Mafia. Honestly feels like you're just saying this because I'm being lined up for the bandwagon of the day.]]

 

[elyvorg]

[[Some more OOC mechanics-related posting. At some point I want to get back to doing some actual RPing with Tefiren because there's a few things he'd react interestingly to going on here, but none of that would be game-relevant, so it can wait. (Especially because I don't quite have the energy for it right now. This whole business is making me a bit stressed too, because I've wound up feeling - probably mostly irrationally and certainly through nobody else's fault - that I'm the reason a lot of other players are feeling like this. Silly Mafia game giving us all these bad emotions.)

So, because they accidentally struck the (potential??) arsonist last night, completely at random, Tefiren felt like he'd been able to be able to figure out who the remaining mafia members are.

Oh, haha, Tefiren's ridiculous excitement may have somewhat misconstrued that. The reasons to potentially be suspicious of Wes and Altair (and, to be fair, maybe Alexander)'s voting have nothing to do with the fact that Lance flipped third-party.

Basically, towards the end of yesterday, I was thinking, "well, Lance is probably going to flip town and we'll be down a townie, but at least if he does, we'll get all this interesting evidence from the people who voted for him, so it wasn't a waste." And because he flipped not mafia, it's basically the equivalent of him flipping town, in terms of what we can glean from the voting. The mafia wouldn't have known he was third-party when they voted for him.

The fact that he was actually incidentally third-party was just an extra bonus, unrelated to the voting, that makes the fact that he died also a plus for us. It's a win-win when I wasn't expecting it to be! That's why Tefiren was so excited.

[[Yeah, Jesse having been the vigilante occurred to me as well. But I will also say I don’t think a vig should necessarily claim here? They’d be another very juicy town target, and all claiming the Lusamine kill would do is dispel the notion it was the arsonist, which I think is easily counterable without it. Vig might just be staying silent.]]

Yeah, that's fair. It was probably misguided of me to imply that the vigilante should speak up. I guess I was thinking of last game where Namo took immediate credit for a vigkill, but then they'd already claimed vig a couple of days prior, so of course they would.

[[Yeah, I wouldn’t want to treat Rascal being Hider as more confirmed than it is... there are other explanations for multiple kills on N1. I don’t think that changes much, though.]]

Also a fair point, I shouldn't have implied that was confirmed. I just can't currently come up with any other reason why Rascal died then (we now know it wasn't dockill, because Mewtwo healed me that night), so my brain defaults to Hider because it makes the most sense. I like solving the logic puzzle, dammit.

[[Chappie: if I'm following Elyvorg's logic correctly, if Chappie flips town, it man's that its more likely that Spark/braxien is town (since they were either the mafias original target, Chappie was blocked, or a piercing kill was used), while putting more suspicion on Altair and Wes. Although I'm not quite sure I follow the value of she flips mafia. I think it makes the other three look a bit more suspicious? But I'm not 100% sure here.]]

Dragonfree already explained in more detail than I was going to how Chappie flipping mafia puts suspicion on Braixen, so I'll just cover the other point here. For what I suggested about Altair and Wes in that post, Chappie's alignment doesn't actually matter.

If there was sinister mafia intent behind any of the people who encouraged Chappie to softclaim, this could be for two reasons:

• Chappie is innocent, and the mafia wanted to figure out her role to know how worried to be about her.
• Chappie is mafia, and this was deliberately staged to make the softclaim look genuine and halting and kind-of-accidental, to make us more likely to trust her.

So Chappie's alignment won't give us any more or less reason to be suspicious of Wes and Altair because of it.

(But again, the whole thing with those two plus Lusamine happening to have encouraged her together could entirely be a coincidence and definitely isn't remotely concrete evidence of anything. Just because one of the three was mafia and may have done this with sinister intent doesn't mean the other two were necessarily in on it.)

( @Inkedust too, hopefully this answers the questions you just had about this. This whole thing is really not a big point and I'm really not any significantly more suspicious of you because of it; I just wanted to at least point out the possible pattern.)

[[Based on the scorch marks, I just have to assume that the Arsonist is still around. To me this is a case of Negrek would not make things unclear if she didn't have to. She could have written literally anything else for the flavor; she was the one who put the Arsonist in the game. I hear what other people are saying but I'm going with Navar was some other kind of third-party, and our fire-setter's still out there.]]

What if the scorch marks were Jesse's vigkill? Or whoever else might be the vig. As Dragonfree said, the flavour for the arsonist in this game is apparently something psychic. I just don't think we can be certain about what this flavour is meant to imply either way.

[[I'm not going to announce my healing intentions unless Townies are in agreement; but, Wes--if you're innocent--if we don't coordinate I think our best odds are to choose our targets randomly, as I was doing.]]

My thoughts on this are that, because it's possible one of you is scum, definitely neither of you should announce your heal, because you'd just be telling the other where to aim their deliberate healer clash if they were indeed mafia-aligned. I think randomly seems like the best idea to me.

[[1) If you're innocent, any Town is targeting you or boosting your theory is making just as big a mistake as you could; this is not a solo game; you and your teammates live or die together. Not to mention, the Mafia is probably in some way trying to turn the Town against each other. Basically, you're facing misunderstanding/inobservantness from your teammates, plus malignant influence from the party who knows you're innocent.]]

Very good point! If any of the people I'm suspecting are actually innocent, then I'm the one making a bad play by accusing them. Especially in Wes's case, since I've realised now that a lot of my tunnelling on him was not actually logically warranted at all.

[[In case something happens with this, I'm pretty sure I also encouraged to Chappie to come out with what she knew. This was after she had softclaimed *something* with saying Lexx was their fault. My reasoning (which I don't regret) is that since they're already admitting to knowing something, that something might as well benefit the rest of the Town.]]

Granted, but that happened a bit after the softclaim. If Chappie's innocent, then the softclaim alone was what did the damage of letting the mafia guess her role. If Chappie's mafia, then she and her conspirator(s) could have been expecting a townie to come along after her softclaim and point out that she might as well claim the whole thing, and that'd make it look more genuine.

[[Also, consider that Phan also tried a Elyvorg sus after Wes. If Wes is guilty, that means they were Phan's scumbuddy, and their moves against Elyvorg would have been in coordination. Other people may have different interpretations, but for me it seems odd that the Mafia would have one sus mostly fail and then try again.]]

Eh, I mean, I think it's odd that Lusamine tried at all after Wes's flail got me side-eyeing him, even if his was genuine. The results of that should have told anyone that trying to push suspicion on me (at least without fully understanding the reasoning behind why people trust me) would be liable to make them look bad... but she did it anyway.

I do agree with your general thought that both of them trying the same tactic if they're both mafia feels like it's a bit too obvious, though. Hm. Yeah, I'm really not sure about Wes any more.

]]

 

[windskull]

How does Chappie flipping Town make me more suspicious? I'm genuinely confused here, because you also insinuate that I'll still look worse if she flips Mafia. Honestly feels like you're just saying this because I'm being lined up for the bandwagon of the day.]]

[[I think I may still be a bit confused about how Chappie flipping affects things too lol. I understand conceptually what elyvorg is getting- that Chappie's allignment would provide valuable information - at but somewhere along the way I'm getting confused. Free's post helped clear things up a bit though. I think.]]

 

[Dragonfree]

The Archopy had yet another confident theory about how he'd solved everything, and as irritating as he was, some of it did kind of make sense. Sure would explain that bizarre fucking swap thing.

"Given it seems like swapper over here's just checked out altogether and is dramatically asking to be killed" -- he waved a hand in front of the Luxio's creepy vacant stare -- "I'm starting to think we may want to just jail her today and find out once and for all if there's anything to this. If not, she might"

He sighed, looking away. Why'd it have to be a fucking Luxio. Different Luxio, not even all that similar-looking, but it still creeped him the fuck out.

"But okay, one thing Tefiren didn't cover in the possible alternative explanations is that Lexx dying wasn't the mafia after all. Maybe the mafia went after Rascal for some fucking reason; maybe their kill fizzled entirely. It'd still mean somebody targeted Spark for a kill, which seems random as all hell, unless it was the arsonist. Arsonist douses Lexx night zero and ignites him night one, which'd mean it doesn't get swapped. Still technically possible, and the arsonist could've thought he was the biggest threat to them after Lexx talked about wanting to catch the arsonist on day one, and wanted him gone before he'd have more time to try to figure them out, figuring they had time to get rid of Nefari later before she picked up the firefighter power. So I guess that's one possibility where Chappie's innocent and nobody's making completely insane decisions."

[[Just something that occurred to me earlier. Still do think Chappie's claim seems super suspect given everything.

I want to try to reread some stuff to figure out exactly how much I suspect Inkedust and Wes. Instinctually I trust Wes right now, but I won't feel any degree of confidence in that without going back to take a closer look at his posts. I agree with Equitial that I don't think Wes casting suspicion on elvyorg initially was necessarily a suspicious move to make, as I think I mentioned before; I voted him yesterday mostly because I didn't like the Lance wagon, figured some of his behaviour could be the mafia sort of flailing, and going for somebody I kind of suspected who already had a vote on him was more likely to result in the final lynch being productive than starting a new wagon based on suspicions that weren't much less vague. But I didn't get an actual chance to reread his posts even then before voting, so I feel like my idea of exactly how he's been posting is still kind of vague.

I've vaguely liked Inkedust's posts today so far but am not dropping my side-eye without a reread there either.

Still kinda down to lynch Namco, but if Chappie's genuinely wanting to stop playing the game, I'm sorry you feel that way but then the best move is to get her flipped so we can keep solving.]]

 

[Dragonfree]

[[Oh no I've caught Negrek's unfinished sentences disease, I'm not even sure exactly what I was planning to write there]]

 

[elyvorg]

[[How does Chappie flipping Town make me more suspicious? I'm genuinely confused here, because you also insinuate that I'll still look worse if she flips Mafia. Honestly feels like you're just saying this because I'm being lined up for the bandwagon of the day.]]

[[For what it's worth, I don't think that was windskull trying to throw nonsensical shade on you; I think they were just unsure about my logic and expressing their confusion.

Dave's theory in which Lexx was arsoned makes some amount of sense I guess, but it still requires that the mafia deliberately went for Rascal, which also seems like an odd pick. Unless Rascal actually was a bodyguard like some people initially guessed and was protecting someone more important, oh geez, why does this keep getting more complicated]]

 

[Dragonfree]

"Or the mafia went for you, and Mewtwo healed you."

 

[Fusion]

Additionally I would like to see espy and fuse talk more but as of right now they're both still null for me.

[[The level of complication and brain power in Mafia is so far above my pay grade that I had to hire an intern last game to brain for me. And that intern was me, and I cheaped the fuck outta the work and I had nothing on the table most of the time. I'm pretty sure my brain is constantly set to "in the now" mode during these things, so all I have to go off is what everyone else has.

So, to try and rectify this, I wanted to steal Jackie's note board and try to update it every now and then. Keeps me mentally tethered to the game, and drills in that mindset of detectiveness into me brain.

The only downside is how easily I can get lost in the giga posts everyone does, like trying to find clothes in a soup store.

Anyway, I'm gonna commit theft and steal a magical whiteboard. Eventually. By the end of this actual day. someone hold me to that, please.]]

Fusion blinked, shaking his head again. For how quiet everything was, it was unnervingly loud. "...Does anyone have any Tylenol? Or any headache medicine? Those don't exactly work on my race but at least then I could pass out from a overdose. Not like that would last long, the tens of guardian spirits or whatever are probably gonna keep me up anyway."

 

[Namohysip]

"...What in Void's name is a Tylenol, some kind of fruit?"

 

[Fusion]

"Man-Made medicine for headaches and... I think fevers? I've never used it for any of those, just to knock myself out whenever I don't want to deal with something," Fusion chuckled. "My friends always freak out when I do it, I think they think I'm allergic or something."

 

[elyvorg]

The Human with the funny arm started yelling about how he was a healer, how he'd been trying to save the half-zolt - but he wouldn't fool Tefiren that easily; obviously that was just a Mafia trick! He told the Human so, and the Human only got angrier.

The big dark bird bristled with indifference, as if he didn't even think Tefiren's brilliant deductions meant all that much about him at all - but really, really because he didn't know how to argue against it, obviously. The purple fox who'd used to be a tiny Raichu simply looked confused.

All the while, the thunder cat kept glaring at him, not saying anything, her face showing not just anger, but something... something else.

Tefiren wanted to giggle again - they were making this so easy - but for some reason, he didn't, his excitement halting, his laughter stuck in his throat like it'd got caught on a branch and couldn't get free.

And then the thunder cat turned away from him completely, and in an empty voice, asked to be caught.

Tefiren stared at her back as her words sunk in. She wanted to lose.

She wanted to lose, because of him. He'd made her think that way.

That was fine, though! That was supposed to be good, because it meant Tefiren was winning, because he was going to win this game and of course that'd mean he'd make his enemies want to lose - but...

Abruptly, Tefiren turned away from the thunder-cat and looked somewhere else. The rest of the group were staring at him, except... most of them didn't even look that impressed. The messy Human had said that he'd had a point, but even then he wasn't falling over himself to tell Tefiren how right and clever he was, like he should have been. And some of them - not just the ones who were definitely Mafia, but some of the others, too - were giving him these looks, as if he was the problem here, as if they thought he was...

Tefiren twisted away from the group entirely, without another word, slinking back to his tree at the outskirts and settling himself among the boughs where he couldn't be seen so easily. All of this was their problem, if they couldn't play the game well enough. If they weren't focusing on it properly and finding it fun and getting excited about winning, then how could they blame Tefiren for being better at it than all of them?

He was still going to win. He didn't need their help. Anyone else would just get in his way.

[[

Aaand that was me doing the healthy coping mechanism of projecting some of my stresses over this onto my character. :3 Turns out Tefiren is not quite as completely oblivious about his callousness as he might usually seem.]]

She looked up at him with a smile. "You see, this is why I and a few others were worried for you after you survived that first attack. Even without tricks, you're smart." Even if he was pretty cocky... he definitely seemed to have the brains to back up his mouth.

[[Assume this part happened earlier, while Tefiren was explaining his voting theory or something, before he got pushed into sulking like he did just now.]]

Tefiren halted in his explanation, caught off-guard, staring in puzzlement as the Human with the stick looked right at him and told him she was... she was worried about him? And - and that he was smart, even without his tricks, yes; that made sense.

"Of course I'm clever, too!" he told her after a moment's pause, grinning. "You'll never get anywhere in a game like this if you don't have smarts, as well as tricks!"

And the way she was looking at him, smiling, almost like--

...No. It didn't matter.

And anyway! He had so much more to explain to everyone! He'd only just begun to show them all just how clever he was!

[[

hello yes please more RP in which Miyako completely unintentionally reminds Tefiren of a certain someone, even if it's only based on the fact that she vaguely admires him and is treating him like a person

and now, back to the present in which Tefiren is totally fine and well-adjusted and everyone else is the problem

]]

Through his tree, everyone's voices came through a lot more muffled, such that Tefiren couldn't quite make out exactly what they were talking about. Something about whether or not to get rid of the thunder cat today, and whether or not he was right about her and the others. The answer to both of those questions was yes, obviously, but the rest of them were too stupid to see that right away and were going to keep squabbling about it for most of the day, probably. He didn't need to listen in.

But then, though he could tune most the voices out, he was suddenly hit with a thought. Tefiren's head jolted up in surprise as he realised it was the think-talky one, telling everyone that he'd protected Tefiren on the night after his guessing game, probably pointing the thought right at Tefiren too to make sure he heard.

That--! That was... Well, it wasn't like Tefiren would have needed it, obviously. He could escape from anything; he'd told everyone just the evening before that night! The think-talky one should have realised that he didn't even need to bother.

But... But still. At least some people here knew he was clever, knew that he was good at this game, knew that he was worth...

...worth keeping around.

"Or the mafia went for you, and Mewtwo healed you."

And then, some more words that came through clearly despite the muffling leaves - that messy Human's voice could be so loud sometimes - that were also directly about him.

But, no. Obviously that couldn't have been what happened. Tefiren would have known, would have been chased, would have felt that thrill and delight of escaping once again just like he always did. That messy Human was trying to make it sound like he'd have needed someone else to protect him, as if that'd be the only reason he couldn't have been caught.

[[Tefiren's not in the mood for logicking right now, so hi, Dave, Tefiren's patron board game god here - how does that explain how Rascal died, though?]]

 

[Seren]

[[ hi quick post while on my break because...

"But okay, one thing Tefiren didn't cover in the possible alternative explanations is that Lexx dying wasn't the mafia after all. Maybe the mafia went after Rascal for some fucking reason; maybe their kill fizzled entirely. It'd still mean somebody targeted Spark for a kill, which seems random as all hell, unless it was the arsonist. Arsonist douses Lexx night zero and ignites him night one, which'd mean it doesn't get swapped. Still technically possible, and the arsonist could've thought he was the biggest threat to them after Lexx talked about wanting to catch the arsonist on day one, and wanted him gone before he'd have more time to try to figure them out, figuring they had time to get rid of Nefari later before she picked up the firefighter power. So I guess that's one possibility where Chappie's innocent and nobody's making completely insane decisions."

... just wanted to acknowledge that I’m pretty sure I mentioned something similar earlier in the thread and had people telling me it wouldn’t happen this way because it wasn’t the optimal move for the arsonist to make, as well as the flavoring didn’t line up. Don’t honestly remember if I had said he targeted Lexx or Rascal, will come back to that after work tonight, but I did wanna just say that I feel somewhat vindicated that someone other than me is even considering this possibility, however much of a stretch is might turn out to be. ]]